While I don’t write full-time, nor do I make
enough money with my writing to live off of it...neither do all of the
professional writers above...someone pays for and publishes ten percent of what
I write. When I started this blog, that was NOT true, so I may have reached a
point where my own advice is reasonably good. We shall see! Hemingway’s quote
above will now remain unchanged as I work to increase my writing output and
sales! As always, your comments are welcome!
With “The Penguin
Whisperer” I did everything right – except the ending; not of the story, but of
my actions. But I’ll get to that at the end.
First thing I did
right, was I listened. Lonnie Plecha, editor at CRICKET MAGAZINE was a guest of
honor at the 2011 Minnesota SCBWI Fall Conference and spoke a few times. One of
the things he said was that they were looking for science fiction.
AH! I wrote science
fiction! I’d even had a story in CRICKET long ago (in the previous century! I
wrote about that here: http://faithandsciencefiction.blogspot.com/2014/09/writing-advice-what-went-right-in.html).
I could write a story for him!
I returned from the
conference and started to examine my ideas. I’d learned by now (finally) that
any story for kids had to have a sort of “double meaning”. It had to entertain,
which is first and foremost.
This was wisdom
promulgated by the master of science fiction for young people, Robert A.
Heinlein, when he said, “If a writer does not entertain his readers, all he is
producing is paper dirty on one side. I must always bear in mind that my
prospective reader could spend his recreation money on beer rather than on my
stories; I have to be aware every minute that I am competing for beer money -
and that the customer does not have to buy.”
But this isn’t
everything. In a future world that Heinlein had no way of imagining, but is the
one we live in, SF for young people has to serve a second purpose – it has to
teach while at the same time reading like it’s ONLY entertaining.
Just before he wrote
the quote above, he’d outlined the “why” of his writing. While he is famous for
what he wrote and certainly created worlds both exciting and terrifying,
Heinlein was also brutally honest: “Now, for some background on Stranger and my
stories in general: I write for the following reasons – 1. To support myself
and my family; 2. To entertain my readers; 3. And, if possible, to cause my
readers to think. The first two of these reasons are indispensable, and dilute,
together, a commonplace market transaction.”
In my office, I had
a story I’d tried writing a number of years ago that involved penguin research
on the space station of my 1997 story, Courage.
Because penguins have peculiar properties of surviving deep dives and returns
to the surface without any damage from “the bends”, the crew of the space
station was researching them. In the original story, I had the penguins escape,
Candace Mooney follow them, discover that they’d made a slide of ice that had
formed form a leaking water pipe...well, you can see the problem. This was a
vignette with no real driving factor; it wasn’t a story.
Since that time
though, I’d seen a video on a phenomenon that occurred among penguins in the Antarctic
that appeared random, but in fact not only provided a means to surviving the
brutal cold, but was also an event that involved a concept of physics called “colloidal
jamming” (see it here: http://www.livescience.com/41998-emperor-penguin-huddle-physics.html?li_source=pm&li_medium=more-from-livescience&li_campaign=related_test,
and the explanation here: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/06/110601171614.htm).
A little research gave me the concepts and ideas, but besides writing a boring
science article, how could I turn this into a story?
I needed two
characters and a conflict, Candace was one of them, but she was going to be
dealing with a more intellectual problem this time. She needed to be older.
I also needed to
actually invent the research project that the group scientists on Courage would be working on. As well, I
had to expand my understanding of the station’s structure, command, and
departments...
An immense
undertaking, but it seemed to flow and when I was done, I submitted the story,
and the editor bought it the first time around!
I have not sold a
story to him since then – not for lack of trying. I haven’t been able to breech
the defenses of CICADA, either. Have I suddenly become a horrible writer? Have
all of my ideas become stupid?
I don’t think so –
but I DID make a social mistake. For a period, CRICKET MEDIA was in a bit of a
financial crisis. They were not paying their writers on publication, nor were
they moving submissions through the process with any kind of speed. “The
Penguin Whisperer” was published and I waited for my check, as I’d signed the
contract and knew roughly how quickly CM’s financial systems had moved in the
past.
Three months after
the publication of the story, and still without a paycheck, I sent a strongly
worded email of concern, including one to the editor I’d worked with several
times. Shortly after, I was paid in the middle of April – but I greatly fear
that I was put on a “black list” of authors NOT to work with because they’re
troublesome...
So…what did I do
right with “The Penguin Whisperer”?
1) Listened to the
editor.
2) Work to find both
entertainment and education aspects of a story.
3) If an old, unsold
idea is a good one, apply it in a TOTALLY DIFFEENT WAY.
4) Put at least two
characters in conflict.
5) Do as much
world-building “off stage” as you can. It does NOT have to be in the story!
What did I do wrong?
1) Nothing – but I
risked and I may have lost the opportunity to publish in a top market...
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